By U.S. Senator Deb Fischer
Antisemitism is reaching fever pitch across the country, a level I never thought possible in the United States of America. Mere months after Hamas’s October 7th assault on Israel, anti-Israel protests have overtaken one of our most influential cultural institutions: the university.
At Columbia University, students told Jewish students to “Go back to Poland.” At Brown, someone broke into Jewish students’ residence, leaving a note that read: “Those that live for death will die by their own hand.” At Yale, an activist hit a Jewish student with the pole of a Palestinian flag. At Cornell, a student threatened to attack the kosher dining hall on campus and shoot and stab Jewish students.
This sickening behavior is not just anti-Israel and pro-Palestine. It’s antisemitic and pro-Hamas. Students on Ivy League campuses are calling for terrorism and genocide.
It’s disappointing that terrorist sympathizers on college campuses are getting classes and commencements canceled. It’s disturbing that any of these students would express antisemitic views and threaten violence. But the extremism on campuses is just a symptom of the shift in generational views on the state of Israel. According to a poll released last month, Americans under 30 are more likely to sympathize with the Palestinian people than the Israeli people, a significant change from older generations who mainly sympathize with Israelis.
Israel is our strongest ally in the Middle East, and our nations share common interests and values. America cannot abandon our ally in a crucial time of need. If young people can’t recognize Israel’s right to self-defense, will they recognize our own? And if they do not recognize Israeli leadership’s value of life and freedom — contrasted with terror groups — they will not understand the importance of American leadership in the world.
The Biden administration is only validating American youth’s newfound skepticism of — and even outright hostility for — the state of Israel.
On Tuesday, President Biden mourned antisemitism in front of Holocaust survivors and Jewish families at a Holocaust Remembrance Day event. But those words ring desperately hollow in view of his actions.
After the October 7th massacre, the president said he supported Israel’s right to defend itself as a sovereign nation. But now he’s denying the embattled state the military aid it needs to destroy Hamas. The President has already paused shipments of key munitions and threatened to withhold even more if Israel conducts a ground operation in Rafah.
President Biden’s betrayal of Israel is unforgiveable. Not only has he looked the other way as antisemitism rages across campuses — he’s denying weapons shipments to a nation fighting for its very right to exist. If the president does not stand with Israel, his words of sympathy are empty.